trilobyte wrote:I don't think calling it a leave no trace event is inappropriate, I read it as an aspiration. To argue that it should be changed is kind of like arguing that Virginia is for lovers should be changed because that bitch/asshole you fell for in Virginia Beach didn't love you back.

I love you man!

theCryptofishist wrote:

some seeing eye wrote:I think it just requires the impacts be considered and that users conform to their predictions of impact. But I'm not up on case law.

I'm not quite sure what you mean by "users conform to their predictions of impact". I mean if it's a poorly prepared thing, no one may be able to. But I've heard about some real dogs (excuse the term, canine eplayans) getting approval.

No offense taken. I am vulpine.

He's a mystery wrapped in a riddle, inside an enigma, painted in hot pants. - SavannahPropane ToysHow to do it wrong:

trilobyte wrote:I don't think calling it a leave no trace event is inappropriate, I read it as an aspiration. To argue that it should be changed is kind of like arguing that Virginia is for lovers should be changed because that bitch/asshole you fell for in Virginia Beach didn't love you back.

Aspiration is great, but the event is not engineered to be leave no trace. You can't have a week-long festival in a desert hundreds or thousands of miles from where everyone's coming from without the event causing one heck of a trace to be left. And while we're at the event, there are giant art cars roaming around burning fossil fuels for no purpose but entertainment, generators firing away, sequestered carbon being released from burning stuff, etc.

I got married recently, and went to a remote part of Indonesia for our honeymoon. We stayed at an 'eco-resort' in a little-populated area about 5 hours boat ride from the nw tip of Papua/Papua New Guinea. They made quite an effort, and a genuine one at that. All the wood in their mostly wood buildings was fallen wood on that island or nearby islands. Fantastic! It's one of the only places in the world that the reef is making a comeback rather than slowly (or quickly) dying. Awesome!

And then you see how much gas they burn to power the place (including aircon in the bungalows), and to take people back and forth on the 5 hour boat ride with a speedboat with three gigantic motors. Not to mention that all the visitors fly in, some of us making four airplane hops to get to the place from which the boat takes you there. And all the dive boats burning craploads of gas taking people around to dive sites, etc.

So was it dishonest marketing to call it an eco-resort, or is that aspirational? Probably somewhere in between I guess.

Jackass wrote:So what's the real issue here cxbrx? Is it the fact that your formerly intimate gathering is now growing to numbers that you find unacceptable or is it that you "can't" landsail anymore? You're worried over dunes yet you suggest paving the desert? If you really wanna see the surface disturbed I guess that would do the trick. Im sure a patch a asphalt in the middle of this lakebed would last maybe 10 years before it cracks to pieces and falls apart. Why not pave yourself a narrow strip up one side of the playa for landsailing, that would be cheaper and less intrusive

The first point of the appeal is that Burning Man is being rewarded for allegedly going over the 50,000 population limit.

The second point is that the BLM has never completed the Special Recreation Permit process by providing a performance evaluation.

The third point is the dunes.

In the AP article, both the BLM and the LLC respond to the third issue. The BLM says that they won't respond to the population issue while the LLC's appeal is in process. I'd like to hear the BLM respond to the second issue sometime.

The real issue with the first two points is that the BLM fails to follow their own rules. If they are doing this with the Burning Man SRP, what about all the other SRPs? Who know what sort of shenanigans are going on?

The real issue with the third point is that there is a limit to the size of event. Each person has a different opinion about that limit. For example, at a certain point, it will not be possible to move everyone on to the playa and back off the playa in a week because either the sheer numbers of attendees or because dust storms will cause the organizers to prevent entrance or exit.

The "Pave the Playa" idea is a modest proposal a la Jonathan Swift. I agree that it has problems. However, if it were possible to have pavement, then that would reduce the dust. Do you have any ideas on how to reduce the dust?

@DrYes: At its peak, the big land sail event was at most 120 people. Different environment have different limits. I agree that 50k land sailors would have a large impact. Part of my point is that it is worth having a conversation that we are having a negative impact and that it is worth it. Let's be honest and move on from "Leave No Trace" to "Tread Lightly". Others have said that aspiring to LNT is worth it, but I think that being honest trumps. However, there is the tyranny of the majority issue - basically, you are saying that the wants of 60,900 override the wants of a few hundred. A different example is limiting the number of back country permits. Popular hiking areas require a permit for various reasons. In many ways, it would be great to get 50,000 people up Half Dome (think of the buzz !) However, the practicalities of getting people up and down with the ensuing lines and the degradation of the area and the experience resulted in limits being placed. These limits are controversial, some say there should be no limits.

If Burning Man is not causing the dunes, then why do these dunes only appear on the Black Rock Desert? Any there is only one picture of these dunes since before 2000?

@vargaso: It seems like you agree with me, but then you write that the appeal is wrongheaded. Can you write more?

@Foxfur: How do you feel about the first two points of the appeal?

@ Bay Bridge Sue: There is a research paper about dust storms from the BRD, see http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2011/2 ... 4784.shtmlDo you have any sense of where the dust came from in the Winnemucca 2007 dust storm? About taking pictures grandeur vs serpents, it seems like people find the serpents to be interesting. For example, Philippe Glade's 2011 book "Black Rock City, NV: The Ephemeral Architecture of Burning Man" has a picture of the serpents on the cover. One of the projects I've been thinking of is using Google Earth to find where pictures were taken in the past and then take pictures from a similar view point.

@Ruleryak: I think we are in agreement. The more moisture, the better the surface. There are a number of factors that control the amount of moisture on the desert. Most of the moisture comes from the Quinn River, which is fed from the North. Moisture that appears on the desert later in the year helps more than moisture earlier in part because later moisture keeps people off a portion of the desert and in part because the surface is "fresher". From observation, I've seen that years that have snow on the peaks later tend to have later moisture. There have been plenty of years when it has been dry on Memorial Day and wet right before the July 4th weekend. The amount of moisture seems to be related to El Nino. My point, which I probably did not express very well, is that the ability of the desert to recover is based on the amount of moisture. Another Swiftian modest proposal would be that the number of attendees should be based on the amount of rainfall I agree that we've had two or three years of better playa than the previous years. This year was dry, what happens if next winter is dry? One thing we don't agree on is that there were basically zero dunes in 2011. There may have been few dunes within the city, but there were plenty of dunes outside the city. I'm fairly certain that the 2007 trash fence dune was still present in 2011, though it disappeared after the 2011 event.

@pink: My position is that the surface in 2008 was because of the huge volume of dust from the previous Burning Man events. If the year had been wetter, the dust would have been compacted. I think we agree that more moisture == better playa. If you have evidence that the land speed record left scars, then I'd like to see the evidence. Part of the land speed effort is to walk the track and remove debris including rocks and trash (Foreign Object Debris (FOD))- anything that could get sucked into a jet turbine. So, there could have been a cleaner area that was a few miles long. The land speed record camps *did* cause some incidental dune downwind from their temporary buildings. I've seen these dunes next to rvs at Burning Man as well. These dunes dissipated rather quickly. I don't think there were more than 200 people camped out for the land speed record, but I'd have to look into it further to confirm this. BTW - I'm not filing a lawsuit, this is an appeal to the permit in the same way that Burning Man is appeal the BLM's finding that Burning Man violated the 50,000 limit. In the past, Burning Man successfully appealed how the BLM charges the LLC for Burning Man using the same system. Also, I did not file for a stay, which could have actually prevented the sale of more tickets. In hindsight, perhaps I should have, but I chose not to do so.

@Bay Bridge Sue: I'm appealing the increase from 50,000 to 60,900, not the entire permit. I agree that it is in everyone's best interest to have a permitted Burning Man event over Labor Day. My second point about being sure that the BLM provides the Special Recreation Permit (SRP) mandated annual performance evaluation is in an effort to keep the BLM from surprising Burning Man with something like, "Well, Burning Man has failed to meet the XXX stipulation for the last N years so the BLM wil not grant a permit." Burning Man can only benefit from formal feedback from the BLM.

Many, many thanks to those that made thoughtful comments, I really appreciate it.

B. Continue to reduce the city population year-over-year until there are no more dunes?

C. Enjoying watching 10,900 people be affected by their ticket cancelation?

Your timing couldn't be more selfish and brutal after this year's ticket fiasco. If you just wanted to open the issue for an intelligent dialog, why are you challenging the current cap in court at this time? Why not wait until after this year's event?

TITWI

To be on the wire is life. The rest is waiting.
It's show time, folks.....Joe Gideon

I don't have access to the scoping report (if any) and I took a quick look at both draft and final. There was discussion of particulate matter in the air, but I didn't see anything specifically about land sailing...

The Lady with a Lamprey

"The powerful are exploiting people, art and ideas, and this leads to us plebes debating how to best ration ice.Man, no wonder they always win....." Lonesomebri

cxbrx wrote: Popular hiking areas require a permit for various reasons. In many ways, it would be great to get 50,000 people up Half Dome (think of the buzz !) However, the practicalities of getting people up and down with the ensuing lines and the degradation of the area and the experience resulted in limits being placed. These limits are controversial, some say there should be no limits.

Don't tell me you lobbied for that whole half dome permit thing too, fucked it all up. Used to be an annual hike for me til the permit thing, now I don't bother. A permit to climb a rock or mountain? Fuck that! I see where you're going with this, your the kinda guy that lobbies for regulations and rules on everything.

cxbrx wrote:The "Pave the Playa" idea is a modest proposal a la Jonathan Swift. I agree that it has problems. However, if it were possible to have pavement, then that would reduce the dust. Do you have any ideas on how to reduce the dust?

Boy imaging pounding all that rebar into asphalt!

trilobyte wrote:I don't think calling it a leave no trace event is inappropriate, I read it as an aspiration. To argue that it should be changed is kind of like arguing that Virginia is for lovers should be changed because that bitch/asshole you fell for in Virginia Beach didn't love you back.

I left my heart in San Francisco, but yet blood is still flowing through my veins!!! How does that work?!?!?

"All the worlds indeed a stage and we are merely players, performers and portrayers. Each another's audience inside the gilded cage." - N. Peart"SAFETY THIRD" - Some idiot

So one might ask if dunes are a "adverse" impact on the environment. They are, eventually, an inevitability for a dry lake bed, after all.

This location is not designated as wilderness (kind of too late, what with mines all of the place...). I agree that the presence of Burning Man has an impact. Heck, 50,000 people exhale more CO2 than 120 do, so that's an impact even if we had all walked there. But is that impact adverse? Does it affect wildlife? Is it pollution? Certainly this is not comparable to mountain top removal, which the government does allow.

Let's say that the BLM makes a deal to sell the land to the Burning Man Project, with the condition of open access on the existing playa roads. Certainly that is not impossible. Is that what you want? Then you would have no course of action. (http://www.blm.gov/nv/st/en/snplma/Land_Auctions.html).

If your argument is that people have an adverse impact and that this impact is directly proportional to the number of people, then there are only two choices:A.) Set a number (perhaps arbitrarily) for an acceptable level of adverse impact.B.) End the adverse impact completely.

For A, we already have a bid in on that number and that number is 75K. To reach that number the BLM and Burning Man are creeping up to that number gradually to make sure a hideous miscalculaton has not been made.

For B. Well that always remains an option.

One last thing: You say that BM was "rewarded" for exceeding the pop cap last year. Seems to me the BLM stuck with the pop-growth plan, which isn't much of a reward, and also put the event on probation with a promise to cancel the event with another violation. I know you think the pop increase was a "reward", and I can see that point of view in contrast to just holding the numbers steady. But probation is not much of a reward (ask Lindsey Lohan).

First off Your "Tread Lightly" instead of "Leave no Trace" is a counter productive, if "Tread Lightly" became the motto it would instill the thought into the peoples heads that they don't have to worry as much about Moop. In my opinion "tread lightly" puts the thought that one or two traces of a persons being there would be okay, so if 60k+ people all believe that then you have Hundreds of thousands of traces. Where as "Leave no Trace" being the aspiration the majority of people will make an effort to not leave a trace and therefor less of one. I understand it is impossible to live somewhere for a week and truly leave no trace but the trace as a whole would be more if "Tread Lightly" was the motto instead.Second I see you punching holes in your own opinions throughout this whole thread, First you say you were shot at Burning Man then later say you heard gunshots and got scared by a camper in the distance and you were camped on a hill. If you really believe "Pave the Playa" is a good idea then your full of shit in the first place by saying you want to save a ecosystem by paving it. You say over and over again that the amount of rain in the year makes the playa hard or soft, How does the amount of people that show up affect the rainfall that packs the playa?Yes you say your main part of the appeal is that they increased the number over their allotment by 10,900 tickets but all your case bases around is the dust that, as you've stated, has to do more with the amount of rainfall than the people in the previous year.

The major difference between a thing that might go wrong and a thing that cannot possibly go wrong is that when a thing that cannot possibly go wrong goes wrong it usually turns out to be impossible to get at or repair.

Why not raise the cap to accommodate everyone instead of limiting tickets and selling out. Won't the extra income from extra ticket sales support building the city out a few more streets -- do what needs to be done aka 'leave no trace' and eliminate the who gets to attend, or not, system.

Calling all biologists, scholarly environmentalists and the well-informed intelligentsia with accurate empirical stats: What is the harm of dunes in the desert. Are there plants or creeks or anything at BRC that burners destroy by being there. BLM and the fed gov benefit BIG time from our lil $oiree.

Educate me, pah-leese.

And ... what happened to the idea of having major concerts at BM to attract more attendees and provide more value. Thought I read that last year in a survey.

$ky-diving in sprinkling fur, glitter & gummy glo worms seems a viable option oops, i did it again ... left a foot print viral on vimeo, youtube, al jazeera

Hm. Apparently the density of the brine shrimp in the city area is half of what it is elsewhere on the playa.And then there's the oil drips of all those cars (some of them oldish) onto the playa.And much of the limitation of the population is connected to the capacity of 447 anyway.Anyway, this is the FEA, so you can read about it yourself.

The Lady with a Lamprey

"The powerful are exploiting people, art and ideas, and this leads to us plebes debating how to best ration ice.Man, no wonder they always win....." Lonesomebri

@Mrptatomoto: I guess we disagree about "Leave No Trace" vs "Tread Lightly". I prefer to be honest about the results of my activities, but I see your point about aspiring to being better. "Pave the Playa" is a joke, much like Jonathan's Swift "A Modest Proposal" is about eating children to solve problems in Ireland. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Modest_Proposal. Paving the playa is also a strawman or Reductio ad absurdum. However, it is useful to discuss possibly solutions. As mentioned elsewhere, there are problems with paving the playa, but perhaps preparing the playa surface in some manner could help. The amount of rainfall seems to be correlated to how well the Black Rock Desert playa heals. Other nearby playas don't have dunes like this. My appeal has three points, the dunes are the third point. The website is about the dunes.

@ranger magnum: Amen!

@portaplaya: As someone who has studied geology, I agree that dunes are part of a natural progression. I feel that the dust from Burning Man is greatly accelerating the process though. Lake Lahontan disappeared 9,000 years ago, it is sad to see the playa drastically change in 12 years. I'm not sure if the BLM would offer a portion of the playa for sale at this point, but say they would and the LLC bought some acreage. The dunes problem would continue. Some permitting for a public event would probably be necessary (law enforcement, ambulance, fire etc.) I believe that limiting the number of attendees is only a matter of time. The dust storms are getting worse, and getting people on and off the playa takes more time. My opinion is that the rule was 50k, and the BLM allege that the LLC violated that rule. Will the LLC stick with 75k? My appeal discusses how the limit was set in a letter to 50,000, then negotiated upward to an average of 50k per day and then the BLM allege that the number was 53k+ (see the appeal for details). The BLM has not ever done an annual performance evaluation. There has been no formal analysis of the number of attendees since (I believe) 2008. The BLM has been taking the LLC's word on the count, or at least I have not seen any documents since 2008 that include any effort in counting the attendees. About probation: Burning Man is appealing the BLM's effort to put Burning Man on probation, so it is not a done deal. However, how come Burning Man did not announce this? Also, how come to my knowledge, Burning Man has never released attendee figures? How come the LLC and BLM did not respond to the two other points in the appeal?

@plantmandan: I'm not filing a lawsuit, it is an appeal, in the same administrative court where the LLC is appealing the BLM's probation effort. Thanks for asking, but I'm not going this year, I'll probably go again some time in the future.

@thisisthatwhichis: I've been communicating with the BLM about the dunes for a few years. I started to realize that the BLM was not completing the permit process in December of 2011. The feedback provided by the BLM in 2009 and 2010 was about cleaning the playa and did not include feedback other stipulations like population. At this point, because the appeals process is so slow, I'm not sure if anything will happen. If the appeals process was faster, or I had applied for a 30 day stay, then I expect that the population would have been kept at 50k and Burning Man would not have released the recent set of tickets. The reason not to wait is because it is in appropriate to reward a vendor who violated the first stipulation in the permit with a 20% increase. Yes, the timing is unfortunate. The LLC should have gotten or followed better advice about how to manage a sell out event. If Burning Man had stuck with the 50k limit, I would not have appealed.

cxbrx wrote:@Mrptatomoto: I guess we disagree about "Leave No Trace" vs "Tread Lightly". I prefer to be honest about the results of my activities, but I see your point about aspiring to being better. "Pave the Playa" is a joke, much like Jonathan's Swift "A Modest Proposal" is about eating children to solve problems in Ireland. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Modest_Proposal. Paving the playa is also a strawman or Reductio ad absurdum. However, it is useful to discuss possibly solutions. As mentioned elsewhere, there are problems with paving the playa, but perhaps preparing the playa surface in some manner could help. The amount of rainfall seems to be correlated to how well the Black Rock Desert playa heals. Other nearby playas don't have dunes like this. My appeal has three points, the dunes are the third point. The website is about the dunes.

@ranger magnum: Amen!

@portaplaya: As someone who has studied geology, I agree that dunes are part of a natural progression. I feel that the dust from Burning Man is greatly accelerating the process though. Lake Lahontan disappeared 9,000 years ago, it is sad to see the playa drastically change in 12 years. I'm not sure if the BLM would offer a portion of the playa for sale at this point, but say they would and the LLC bought some acreage. The dunes problem would continue. Some permitting for a public event would probably be necessary (law enforcement, ambulance, fire etc.) I believe that limiting the number of attendees is only a matter of time. The dust storms are getting worse, and getting people on and off the playa takes more time. My opinion is that the rule was 50k, and the BLM allege that the LLC violated that rule. Will the LLC stick with 75k? My appeal discusses how the limit was set in a letter to 50,000, then negotiated upward to an average of 50k per day and then the BLM allege that the number was 53k+ (see the appeal for details). The BLM has not ever done an annual performance evaluation. There has been no formal analysis of the number of attendees since (I believe) 2008. The BLM has been taking the LLC's word on the count, or at least I have not seen any documents since 2008 that include any effort in counting the attendees. About probation: Burning Man is appealing the BLM's effort to put Burning Man on probation, so it is not a done deal. However, how come Burning Man did not announce this? Also, how come to my knowledge, Burning Man has never released attendee figures? How come the LLC and BLM did not respond to the two other points in the appeal?

@plantmandan: I'm not filing a lawsuit, it is an appeal, in the same administrative court where the LLC is appealing the BLM's probation effort. Thanks for asking, but I'm not going this year, I'll probably go again some time in the future.

@thisisthatwhichis: I've been communicating with the BLM about the dunes for a few years. I started to realize that the BLM was not completing the permit process in December of 2011. The feedback provided by the BLM in 2009 and 2010 was about cleaning the playa and did not include feedback other stipulations like population. At this point, because the appeals process is so slow, I'm not sure if anything will happen. If the appeals process was faster, or I had applied for a 30 day stay, then I expect that the population would have been kept at 50k and Burning Man would not have released the recent set of tickets. The reason not to wait is because it is in appropriate to reward a vendor who violated the first stipulation in the permit with a 20% increase. Yes, the timing is unfortunate. The LLC should have gotten or followed better advice about how to manage a sell out event. If Burning Man had stuck with the 50k limit, I would not have appealed.

I think it's wonderful that more tax payers are getting to utilize this beautiful desert known as Black Rock, instead of keeping it just for locals to occasionally drive out for their personal pleasure. The difference between 50,000 and 60,000 is virtually ZERO when it comes to impact on the surface.I say, the more the merrier!

I agree with Sham. Once you hit the point of diminishing returns (my best guesstimate was when the population passed 35,000), the increase in population would have a negligible effect on the playa surface. That doesn't help with entry and exodus of course, but that's not the arugment.

oneeyeddick wrote:What about the added benefits of population increase, like all the extra beer cans that Recycle Camp gets to smash?

And the corresponding influx of revenue to the locals of Fernley, Nixon, Wadsworth, Gerlach, and both the Jackrabbits still living in Empire... prolly even some overflow to Vya and Lovelock... Hell, look at the cash that BRC brings into the Reno area.

I bet THEY'RE not pissed at BLM. Maybe it will keep enough revenue flowing into NDoT and Washoe/Pershing County to keep 447/34/446 well maintained. MAYBE even ad a 3rd (reversable) lane to 447... Hell, maybe even an overflow of funds to improve Jungo/S.V./Roads... (Now THAT would f'n rock)